Sales of ice cream and frozen yogurt products have risen dramatically in recent years. The applicant herein has captured a portion of this product market through the development of a unique novelty ice cream and frozen yogurt product in the form of beads. This product, marketed under the trademark "Dippin' Dots.RTM." and "Ice Cream of the Future.RTM.", has become very popular in specialty stores and at fairs and theme parks.
The applicant has proprietary rights in the method of preparing and storing the product pursuant to U.S. Pat. No. 5,126,156, issued Jun. 30, 1992. As is described, the patented method involves delivering flavored liquid dairy composition to a feed tray and then dripping the composition into a freezing chamber. The feed tray comprises a sieve plate having orifices formed therein. The liquid dairy composition passes through the sieve plate and forms droplets that fall into the freezing chamber.
The falling droplets of liquid composition freeze rapidly in the freezing chamber, forming solid beads of flavored ice cream or yogurt product. The frozen beads are removed from the freezing chamber and packed for distribution and later consumption.
While the sieve plate of the feed tray is adequate for facilitating the formation of the desired beads, it has been found that there is a wide range in the sizes of the frozen beads. Most detrimentally, liquid particles or specks tend to be released from the sieve plate which form frozen particles in the nature of microbeads. The frozen microbeads are not only undesirable in appearance, but also adversely affect the collection of usable product. Thus, the formation of frozen microbeads introduces inefficiency into the process of preparing the frozen beaded ice cream or yogurt product.
Accordingly, a need is identified to create a way to eliminate the formation of frozen microbeads during product manufacture. It has been determined through experimentation that a structural modification can be made to the feed tray to bring about the desired result.